This relates to media sharing communities and to methods, apparatus and software for supporting such communities. The invention is described in detail in the context of communities for sharing audio information such as music using Portable Electronic Devices and the like; but the invention may also be practiced to share other information and/or using other modalities. The sharing of location based audio streams and or other digital files can be used for both personal and commercial purposes using the described methods, apparatus and software networks for supporting such functionalities.
Portable Electronic Devices such as the iPhone and the Android and other consumer electronic products such as iPod touches and iPads are widely used to listen to music that is stored in the listener's Portable Electronic Device or other product and/or as it is streamed from a source such as the iTunes store. We will refer to these and all other devices capable of supporting our functionality as Portable Electronic Devices. Often, the listener uses a set of headphones to listen to the music. If the listener desires to share his/her listening experience, choices are limited. The use of speakers probably is not feasible because the headphones are likely being used because the listener is in a public place where others do not want to listen to the music. And sharing the headphones at best creates an awkward situation in which two listeners are tethered together by the signal leads to the headphones.